The present invention generally relates to magnetic tape devices, and more particularly to a read/write head of a magnetic tape device which is configured and adapted to reduce the amount of tape floating that occurs at high tape speeds.
In general, conventional read/write heads used in typical magnetic tape devices are constructed such that the magnetic tape travels over a tape running surface of the heads. Reading and writing operations are conducted on the tape using read/write elements which are arranged along the tape running surface. To conduct the reading and writing operations with a suitable level of efficiency, the amount of tape floating, i.e., the distance between the tape running surface of the head and the recording surface of the tape, needs to be reduced as much as possible while the magnetic tape is traveling over the running surface. This has been difficult to accomplish, particularly in magnetic tape devices that generate high magnetic tape speeds to increase data capacity.